How to Create a Location-Aware Annotated List of Venues for my iPhone?
December 13, 2011 9:04 AM   Subscribe

How to Create a Location-Aware Annotated List of Venues for my iPhone?

I maintain a fairly lengthy text list of restaurants, including name, contact info, and recommended dishes. I'd like my iphone to be able to show me a list of nearby ones, along with the respective notes.

I suppose the first step is to look up each place's geolocation. I know I can do this via google maps, but is there any way to speed or automate the look-up process? Or, better, have it done as a bulk process?

And once I have the geolocations….then what?

I've experimented with Google maps (via BatchGeo, which automates batch-look-ups), but that yields the familiar mess of frequently overlapping flags which must be individually clicked to see any information at all (also, custom google maps must be viewed in Safari, and are real sluggish to load).

What I'd prefer is something similar to Yelp: a list of restaurants (including my notes) sorted by proximity.

I'm figuring there might at least be a hack-ish solution; e.g. there are to-do apps which alert when you're close to a location hosting an assigned task. So maybe I could piggyback on something like that? Or maybe one of those user-friendly app-building programs (though I'd probably have to jailbreak).
posted by Quisp Lover to Computers & Internet (6 answers total) 2 users marked this as a favorite
 
Foursquare's Radar does exactly this. You can make a list of places that you want to visit, add a note to each place, and turn on Radar, which will ping you when you're near one of these venues.
posted by kathryn at 9:13 AM on December 13, 2011 [1 favorite]


Response by poster: Thanks, but I don't want to use their list. I want to use mine. Their list doesn't include all my venues. Nor does Yelp's or anyone else's.

This project has to utilize my list; that's key.
posted by Quisp Lover at 9:16 AM on December 13, 2011


Response by poster: Also, I don't want to be pinged. I want to see a list of venues sorted by proximity.
posted by Quisp Lover at 9:18 AM on December 13, 2011


Just to clarify, the location-based notifications are the "Radar" feature of Foursquare.

You can always sort venues on your list based upon proximity within the Foursquare iPhone application, even with Radar off.
posted by kathryn at 9:21 AM on December 13, 2011


Response by poster: Ok, but I could do same via Yelp bookmarking. But I want to use my venue list, and I want to batch create it (rather than do hundreds of search-and-bookmark actions in my browser).
posted by Quisp Lover at 9:33 AM on December 13, 2011


Fusion tables ( tables.google.com ) could be a good step.
Here is an example using bike crashes in chicago ( yes i know, but its all location data at the bottom) LINK

You can make a similar web interface to query the data .
posted by stuartmm at 10:08 AM on December 13, 2011


« Older Have there been any studies about the effect of a...   |   Display Photos in Calendar Online Newer »
This thread is closed to new comments.